The experience of the Institute of Development Studies, U.K.

Abstract

The Institute of Development Studies of the United Kingdom was formally established in April, 1966, having begun its activities in January of that year. In its decade and a half of existence, the Institute has undergone major changes, whilst at the same time exhibiting a remarkable degree of continuity in its fundamental features. Both those aspects that have changed and those that have remained constant, have been at points a source of practical dilemmas and contradictions as well as intellectual tension and spirited debate. The impact of those dilemmas and tensions in the life of the Institute has on the whole been creative, although at times less so the experience has always been instructive. While the Institute we are now inaugurating is a very different one, a review of that experience might be of use to our hosts. It will be, of course, for them to decide the extent of that usefulness. The following remarks will address themselves first to a review of the activities, organisation and finance of the IDS; they will then examine the main areas of change and continuity, the tensions associated with them and their resolution, sometimes in the form of more or less uneasy compromises; they will conclude by very briefly assessing the contribution of the Institute - emerging from that experience - to the field of development studies and to development.